TV One Series to Tackle Justice/Mystery Genre

1/09/2012 12:01 AM Eastern

By: By R. THOMAS UMSTEAD

TV One will shine a light on missing African-Americans as part of a new series that will help usher the networkinto the justice and mystery genre.

The series, Find Our Missing, will tell the story of the missingperson or persons, beginning with the day they vanishedand the frantic searches by loved ones and investigators tofind them, TV One CEO Wonya Lucas said.

Hosted by Emmy and Golden Globe Award-winning actressS. Epatha Merkerson, the series will launch Jan. 18 onthe African-American channel. Lucas said the network willcomplement the on-air series with social media and onlinecontent. The network’s website, www.tvone.tv, will offer informationon what to do if someone is missing, tips on howto prevent abductions and additional stories of missing people,including some who have been found.

TV One’s Find Our Missing is the latest series riff on thegenre, which includes Investigation Discovery’s current docuseries Disappeared and the CBS procedural drama Without aTrace, which aired in the late 2000s.

“Finding Our Missing is relevant to the African-Americancommunity — nearly one-third of people who go missing areAfrican-American, and we only represent 12% of the population— but from a media perspective, the focus is rarely onAfrican-Americans that are missing,” Lucas said. “It also hasan element of public service — we’ll be able to help find thesepeople and tell their stories, which aren’t being told on a nationalscale.”

Lucas said the justice/mystery genre plays well on televisionin general and in particular to African American viewers.“When you look at the justice/mystery shows, whetherits dramas or nonfiction, it’s a staple of good TV,” she said.“One of the reasons why is that it features great storytellingthat’s relevant.”

Lucas said the justice/mystery/survival genre will be one ofseveral genre pillars of the network’s original primetime programmingin 2012. The network hopes for a rebound after itsits primetime audience fell 9% in 2011 from 2010.

TV One will continue to tap the bio/documentary genrewith such shows as Unsung and Life After, and the comedygenre with its sophomore original series Love That Girl! andtwo other as yet unnamed sitcoms in development.

The network also has mined the love-and-relationshipsgenre with its dating show The Ultimate Merger and nextmonth will debut Love Addiction, in which individuals gothrough an intervention process to cure their often destructiverelationship issues.

TV One has also acquired Soul Food, which ran for fiveseasons in the mid 2000s on Showtime, Lucas said.

“Our overall strategy is to think about the African-Americanviewer and what theywatch on television, and to be the premieredestination in a broad sense,” she said.